Harry Potter mania

[Trevor Salyzyn]

Tolkein gets high praise from me. Every single character was 3-dimensional. Tolkein's narrator had to restrain himself considerably: the book could have easily been far longer without dragging. You could see the fully omniscient narrator of high literature (Les Miserables, Don Quixote, Canterbury Tales, etc.) restricting himself to limited omniscience of fantasy: as such, there was depth to the narrative that was only hinted at, but only revealed in Tolkein's notebooks.

Comparing Rowlings to Tolkein is unfair to both of them. A book store may class them both as fantasy, but I would not consider them both the same genre. Pulp does not need to be fantasy to be pulp. Rowlings may have well been writing Harlequin romance. Tolkein is genuine literature disguised as fantasy: commonly known as allegory (or perhaps, high fantasy).

[Jamesh]

I used to adore a good fantasy book - Stephen Donaldson, Sherri S Tepper, Steven Brust and so on, and that one reason why I haven't bothered reading Harry Potter. I know the writing would be a let down, the story too straightforward with very little novelty (to me at least). Haven't read the Da Vinci Code for the same reason.

In my opinion it is better for kids that they read books like Harry Potter than not read them. It will open up the minds of some, make them more imaginative, more ameniable to differences of opinion. Most importantly it will lead them into reading more books. About 25% of the kids who read Harry Potter would not read any books at all, if it were not for the fad of this series.

With regard fantasy - well why not!. As there is no objective purpose or meaning to anything, then why not indulge in fantasy. I don't see it as a problem like the mystery-ascetics do.

[Pye]

Diebert writes:

No, it's not a matter of taste, that great stick of modernity that beats everything and everyone dead because in death, with lack of taste buds, we're finally equal...

I guess I admire your bloodhounding after relativism, Diebert, but in matters of entertainment, you will have to deal with the relativity of taste. There is no [other] accounting for it, as the saying goes.

Apparently, this is far more than a matter of one's entertainment choices for you. It's deadly serious. Why not take on the task you set Trevor for yourself? And whilst you're at it, perhaps you can put forward some more tasteful suggestions for how we ought to be entertained. Maybe even a case for no entertainment at all?

Or perhaps turn up that tender underbelly and defend your own entertainment choices to us, being as this is not, to you, a matter of tastes.

[Trevor Salyzyn]

If you honestly believe that one's chosen entertainment has no effect on the rest of one's thought whatsoever, then there is no argument against Harry Potter.

But if Harry Potter conflicts with philosophic inquiry by promoting terrible values in a way that will convince people who would otherwise not be swayed in that direction, then there is a case against Rowlings.

Does entertainment have a measurable influence on our choices?

[Pye]

Trevor writes:

If you honestly believe that one's chosen entertainment has no effect on the rest of one's thought whatsoever, then there is no argument against Harry Potter.

Oh goodness, no, I would never maintain this kind of imperviousness. But Trevor, Harry Potter is a drop in the ocean. The thought of expending my fullest energies upon a critique of all modes of entertainment for their philosophic content is a crushing thought of Sisyphusian proportions. I have other rocks to push up the hill - ones that have a chance in hell of making it.

[ChochemV2]

I think a more fair comparison would be R.A. Salvatore. Neither are fantastic writers, however, Salvatore make much deeper characters with characteristics you discover as you read his books, history which gradually unfolds and subtle hints of that history (through the actions of said characters) from their first emergence in his stories. He dives right into the genre and setting which Tolkien popularized and while his stories are admitted much shallower and follow fairly predictable paths they don't interest you because you can identify with them (as children can with Harry Potter) but because they are so fantastical.

Harry Potter is such obvious crap when compared to relative crap like Forgotten Realms or Dragonlance it blows me away how people have obsessed over the series.

In my opinion it is better for kids that they read books like Harry Potter than not read them. It will open up the minds of some, make them more imaginative, more ameniable to differences of opinion. Most importantly it will lead them into reading more books. About 25% of the kids who read Harry Potter would not read any books at all, if it were not for the fad of this series.

There is much better fantasy than Harry Potter out there. I'd rather children read something morally neutral than something which reinforces the socially accepted claim that children should want to be "normal". Harry Potter is nothing but indoctrination for weak minds; it teaches children how to assimilate and that assimilation won't make them any less capable of doing wonderful things. Every single character reflects a social stereotype you will find represented by every single clique in every single school across the country. Rowling may want to say to children "It's ok to be whatever you want" but since she is so blind it comes out as "You can be whichever cliche stereotype you want to be".

I'd rather children read nothing than this but ultimately I'd prefer they read Tolkien, Alexander, R.A. Salvatore, Asimov, Sir Walter Scott, L'Engle (though I have my issues with the Wrinkle in Time series), and even Orson Scott Card if they really want fantasy.

[Trevor Salyzyn]

Pye, one of the best ways to express a broad philosophy is by focusing it on as narrow a topic as possible. The problem is that when you focus narrowly on one thing, you often fall into esoteric nonsense. Harry Potter is rubbed in everyone's face, so it's not esoteric. Philosophizing about it's weaknesses is actually a good way to express a more general rule (I am not digging so far into crap literature to find any different example. I don't hunt for this shit. It falls on my plate.)

[btw, R.A. Salvatore was the first novelist I ever read. His characters express ideals, which I liked. Drizzt is the paragon of individualism, and living by one's own philosophy -- even at the expense of civilization. It's quite high quality, although it is still not worth reading for anyone over the age of about 14. The Dark Elf series is being made into a comic book, but I doubt it could be made into a movie without ruining the spirit. Filmmakers would have more luck with something like the Cleric Quintet, which would not require so many weird and wonky special effects: a priest battling a vampire is a pretty easy thing to capture on film; hook horrors, earth elementals, and dark elves not so much.]

[Jamesh]

There is much better fantasy than Harry Potter out there.

Yep.

I'd rather children read something morally neutral than something which reinforces the socially accepted claim that children should want to be "normal".

Nothing the average kid is going to read for entertainment will be morally neutral.

Harry Potter is nothing but indoctrination for weak minds; it teaches children how to assimilate and that assimilation won't make them any less capable of doing wonderful things. Every single character reflects a social stereotype you will find represented by every single clique in every single school across the country. Rowling may want to say to children "It's ok to be whatever you want" but since she is so blind it comes out as "You can be whichever cliche stereotype you want to be".

I've only seen a couple of the movies, so can't really tell. I do think you are talking shit though. Making a mountain out of a molehill, so to speak - gosh it is almost magical the way some of you lot are stretching this out! Regardless of what we may say or do, because of our special philosophical interests, people will be people and kids will want kiddie things like Harry Potter fantasies.

It doesn't matter if it is harmful or not, because nothing we say will make any difference. Our philosophy is simply not attractive to those who do not suffer. I personally would not try and raise a kid to be too far outside of the norm, unless they were the genius type. I would much prefer an average 8-14 year old read Harry Potter, than nothing, or some religious book for kids, or something mushy as recommended by his politically correct feministic female teacher. It needs to be balanced though - I would try and get the kid to read 1 non-fiction book for every 2 novels.

If magic, fantasy and mystery lead kids to be idiots when they grow up, and this becomes part of why we eventually destroy the human race - too much fantasy and not enough reality - then so be it - it aint my problem. Only worry about things you can solve.

[ChochemV2]

I've only seen a couple of the movies, so can't really tell. I do think you are talking shit though. Making a mountain out of a molehill, so to speak - gosh it is almost magical the way some of you lot are stretching this out! Regardless of what we may say or do, because of our special philosophical interests, people will be people and kids will want kiddie things like Harry Potter fantasies.

Read the books with a critical eye and then get back to me.

I'm not claiming Rowlings is part of a government plot to turn our children into drooling zombies so the world can become the 1984 ideal. Rowlings is a spectacularly bad writer who tells a mind-numbingly bad story with schoolyard cliche characters and a Nickelodeon morality.

[Diebert van Rhijn]

I guess I admire your bloodhounding after relativism, Diebert, but in matters of entertainment, you will have to deal with the relativity of taste. There is no [other] accounting for it, as the saying goes.

I'll just throw Nietzsche at you, so my hands stay clean:

"How maliciously we listen now to the big country-fair boom-boom with which the "educated" person and city dweller today permits art, books, and music to rape him and provide "spiritual pleasures"—with the aid of spirituous liquors! How the theatrical scream of passion now hurts our ears, how strange to our taste the whole romantic uproar and tumult of the senses have become, which the educated mob loves, and all its aspirations after the elevated, inflated, and exaggerated! " (La Gaya Scienza - Preface 4)

Apparently, this is far more than a matter of one's entertainment choices for you. It's deadly serious. Why not take on the task you set Trevor for yourself? And whilst you're at it, perhaps you can put forward some more tasteful suggestions for how we ought to be entertained. Maybe even a case for no entertainment at all?

"No, this bad taste, this will to truth, to "truth at any price," this youthful madness in the love of truth, have lost their charm for us: for that we are too experienced, too serious, too merry, too burned, too profound ... We no longer believe that truth remains truth when the veils are withdrawn; we have lived too much to believe this. Today we consider it a matter of decency not to wish to see everything naked, or to be present at everything, or to understand and "know" everything." (La Gaya Scienza - Preface 4)

Or perhaps turn up that tender underbelly and defend your own entertainment choices to us, being as this is not, to you, a matter of tastes.

Oh, it is all about tasting. Philosophy is all about developing taste and tune it to the bone. But there's a difference between not liking pointy hats or spaceships, and denouncing the universal elements which bounds 98% of all movies in this age. The medium has turned cannibalistic, it has destroyed itself, its function and its symbolic power. The world moves on though, unaware of the crucifixion of yet another piece of their God. We got used even to that.